Art by Dan Sekanwagi

Idle - In Words

The three pound human brain is the most sophisticated organ we possess and arguably the most sophisticated organ in the entire universe. The environment in which it finds itself is crucial to what it produces, it’s so adaptive with vast potential to learn and outdo itself when need be.

Unfortunately if the brain is not challenged, it tunes out from the marvel it is meant to be and simply stays idle. In this state it only engages in the fundamental and mundane responses with reflex actions to bodily stimuli.

Human ingenuity on the other hand is a natural response to more challenging conditions. While it is true that the adaptive nature of the human brain can develop ways of functioning in a dysfunctional condition, it is also true that if it is applied, it has the capacity to devise mechanisms that can completely redeem it from the dysfunction altogether.

The same ingenuity has lead to innovations that have vaulted mankind beyond conquering gravity in space quests into intergalactic trajectory. Even though some of it is still in motion picture make-believe, the very idea of putting well imagined stories in believable sequences is reality in itself. The challenge to make a work of fiction to appear realistic spawns technological innovations in cinematographic equipment, makeup artistry, and in the actual acting profession itself.

Therefore labels such as developed and underdeveloped societies are just that, labels. They don’t designate some people as a people to have a higher capacity to achieve than others. All they allude to, or should I say - what the labels should allude to; is that these people are subjected to different conditions and respond according to their needs in their respective locales. For the record, I shouldn’t be misconstrued to mean that some peoples are not outright passive.

My take on this is that all humans are capable of surpassing what they have been able to achieve, their conditions being the same, anyone can learn any new skills although we all have fields that we are more predisposed to excel in faster than in others.

Click image to go back